Crusader defense on a roll

Susquehanna field hockey competed on Sept. 9 at Dickinson College. Despite the Crusaders’ efforts, the offense continued to have trouble as the game ended in a 3-0 loss.

Dickinson took control of the game from the start, scoring their first goal at the 2:20 mark in the first half. The Red Devils extended their lead in the 16th minute with a goal by sophomore forward Emilie Arrix.

After the first two goals, Susquehanna held off Dickinson for the rest of the first half, but Dickinson struck for its third goal at the 55:54 mark.

During the game Susquehanna had two goaltenders — junior Morgan Ludlam, who played for 49 minutes, and senior Alyssa Rothman, who played 21 minutes.

In the 49 minutes that Ludlam played, there were eight shots on the goal, and she saved seven of them. In contrast, during her 21 minutes as goaltender, Rothman had two shots on the goal and let both goals in.

Coming into the loss to Dickinson, Susquehanna had a 2-1 record on the season and its defense had only given up a single goal on the season.

Wahila also explained how the team is a lot more experienced than they were last year. This is due to seven seniors who are all getting solid playing time.

Senior defender Taylor Snavely added that the team did not change much since last year because they only lost three seniors, although she did note that the team seems to have a more positive outlook this year.

Before the game Wahila talked about a couple players who she wanted to keep an eye on in the game.

“Tessa Woodring has really done a great job defensively, she really stepped it up,” Wahila said. “Allison Caufield has created a lot of corners for us,” she continued.

Even though Susquehanna has home games on Sept. 13 against Ohio Wesleyan and Sept. 19 against SUNY Oneonta, they will not play against a conference opponent until Sept. 26 when they face Scranton at home.

“Our schedule only gets harder from here on out,” she said. “By the time we face Scranton on Sept. 26, we’ll definitely be ready to go.”

Snavely said that as a senior she is excited to play with her team for one final year and see if they can reach the team’s goal of a Landmark Conference championship. Snavely explained that the best way for the team to reach that goal is for them to not get ahead of themselves.

“Our biggest challenge will be taking each game at a time,” Snavely said. “We can’t let ourselves get beat before we play the game.”